What a Dubbing Studio Bathroom Taught Me
- 23 hours ago
- 4 min read
I arrive early for a dubbing session and an ordinary bathroom choice unexpectedly turns into a meditation on space—physical, emotional, and relational. Through memories of cramped New York restrooms and a silent couple in a café, I realize how often I’ve stayed small out of habit. What I really want is simple: room to breathe, talk, and show up fully.
Before Dubbing, A Necessary Pause
It is 8:55 a.m. on a Tuesday and I arrive early at the dubbing studio. Early enough to feel virtuous about my life choices. Early enough to believe today might be a “together” day. Before my voiceover session begins, I decide to make a quick pit stop at the restroom—because nothing says professional readiness like an empty bladder.
There are two stalls. One regular-sized, one wheelchair accessible. The accessible one is at the far end, grand and spacious, like a tiny New York loft with aspirations. I reach for the handle of the smaller stall. Locked. Of course. So I walk the extra two steps—two!—to the larger one, feeling slightly rebellious and also vaguely guilty, as if I’ve cut in line at Trader Joe's. As I wash my hands afterward, a woman exits the bathroom and I catch only the back of her head. Something about it nags at me for the rest of the day. Not her hair. Not her vibe. The question: Why didn’t she choose the bigger stall? This thought follows me around like an unresolved chord.
Bathrooms Designed by People Without Handbags
I grew up in New York City, where square footage is considered a personality trait and bathrooms are more suggestion than space. You don’t enter them—you negotiate with them. Public restrooms were tiny, unforgiving, and designed by someone who clearly never had hips or a handbag.
There was a bathroom at La Folie—a popular disco in the ’90s on the East side whose name literally means madness in French, which tracks—where the toilet had a giant eye painted inside the bowl. An actual eye. Staring up at you. I must have jumped three feet the first time I saw it, mid-squat, questioning my entire existence. It was unsettling, but at least it was memorable. That bathroom had ambition.
Most others were a tight choreography: shimmy in, pivot without elbowing the wall, hover when necessary, flush using a tissue, exit without touching anything, and leave feeling like you’d completed an obstacle course designed by a hostile architect. Somewhere along the line, architects forgot—or never knew—that women have to turn around. A full 180 degrees. With dignity. This is not optional.
The Big Stall Epiphany
Then came the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, and suddenly there was room. Space. Possibility. A bigger stall. For years, I avoided it out of respect. Someone might need it, I told myself, even when I was the only person in the restroom. I stayed small. Contained. Polite.
But in the past year, something has shifted. I've started choosing the bigger stall. Not every time—but enough. Why compartmentalize myself? Why squeeze into a metaphorical shoebox when there’s room to breathe? If I can choose bigger, maybe I can think bigger. Dream bigger. Manifest bigger things instead of constantly defaulting to small, careful, and apologetic.
Lately, that same thinking has been creeping into my work. In acting and voiceover, I’ve started choosing the bigger choice—not louder or more forced, but fuller. More committed. Less polite. Trusting that I don’t need to tuck myself into the safest interpretation just to be acceptable. There’s more room when I let the performance breathe, when I stop minimizing instinct and take up the space the moment actually asks for.
"Why compartmentalize myself? Why squeeze into a metaphorical shoebox when there’s room to breathe? If I can choose bigger, maybe I can think bigger"
What a Dubbing Studio Bathroom Taught Me About Relationships
After the session I run a few errands downtown and stop by my favorite café to write. I strike up a conversation with a nice-looking couple at the next table. A thought crosses my mind, It would be nice to hang out with a guy who smiles at his partner like that. Intimate. Connected. Human. I make a point of looking at the woman half the time so she doesn’t think I’m quietly auditioning to steal her man. I have morals. And peripheral vision. They’re from the East Coast, in town for a podcast conference. It sounds interesting. The guy lights up when he talks about the speakers. The woman smiles—pleasant, reserved, patient. I order a cheeseburger with saffron mayonnaise, my monthly indulgence, because life is hard and saffron mayo understands me. Then I notice… silence. Not a comfortable silence. Not a we’re just enjoying being together silence. A dead-zone silence. The guy goes full tunnel vision on his phone. The woman waits. Patiently. Heroically. Until she, too, pulls out her phone and starts scrolling. Two seemingly nice humans who are obviously together. Sitting inches apart in complete emotionally separate stalls.
Why aren’t they talking to each other?
Maybe they’re planning their day. Maybe they’re tired. Maybe this is modern romance. But watching them feels like watching two people choose the smallest possible bathroom when a bigger one is right there, unlocked, waiting.
And that’s when it hits me.
I don’t just want a relationship. I want an emotionally available one. I want conversation. Curiosity. Loving presence. I want space to turn around without knocking into walls. I want a bigger communication bathroom.
No eye painted in the toilet bowl. Just room to breathe.